Region / Khánh Sơn / 39 km from Nha Trang as the crow flies
A highland plateau in the south-west corner of the province, reached by a pass road from Cam Ranh, with a town called To Hap, a waterfall you hike to, the oldest musical instrument found in Vietnam, and in August, more durian than anyone can eat. I have met almost no other foreigners there.
The dan da Khanh Son is 12 tuned bars of rhyolite porphyry, in two groups of six, found by the family of Bo Bo Ren, a Raglai man, at Doc Gao near To Hap in the late 1970s and dated to about 2,500 to 3,000 years. A national treasure since 2024, it is kept in the provincial museum in Nha Trang; to hear stone played, go to Hon Dung village in Khanh Son.
Ta Gu is a 40 m single-drop waterfall in Son Hiep, Khanh Son, 10 to 15 km from To Hap and about 100 km from Nha Trang. The walk from the road end is a couple of hundred metres over stream crossings and steep wet rock; no source I found requires a guide for the falls, entry is free with a small cleaning fee quoted, and in the wet months the leeches find you.
Go in August. Khanh Son's durian harvest runs from about July to the end of August and peaks in August, a month before the Central Highlands, on over 3,800 ha forecast to give 40,000 to 41,000 tonnes in 2026. It is 100 km from Nha Trang by the one road in, over a 600 m pass from Ba Ngoi in Cam Ranh, and I would stay the night.
this region other regions places in these posts
The highland plateau nobody visits: durian season, the Ta Gu waterfall, the stone lithophone.
Straight-line distance from the Nha Trang beachfront to Khanh Son: 39 km. Road distances are longer and are quoted in the posts from their sources.
